


pitch black, pale blue

by Kingmaking



Series: shake what's left of me loose [2]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Goodbyes, Kissing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-18
Updated: 2019-05-18
Packaged: 2020-03-07 08:27:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18869476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kingmaking/pseuds/Kingmaking
Summary: The men watch Sansa; they watch her as one might look at the sun to know one’s way. But it’s the middle of the night, and the sun is hours from rising./Sansa kisses Theon as the dead approach Winterfell -- only for good luck, of course.





	pitch black, pale blue

**Author's Note:**

> how do you write Anything that isn't 2 pages of sad rambling pls share

The horn wakes him up. Not that he’d been sleeping; he was lost in the comfortable silence, lulled away by warm soup and Sansa’s warmer smile. Enjoying the few hours, the few minutes they had left before the dead came, breathing peace in and out, thinking of Sansa as she’d been then -- scared, eyes rabbit-wide -- and Sansa as she is now, dressed in black and deep grey, sitting her father’s seat and wearing her mother’s pride.

So the horn wakes him up; it’s over. The reminiscing, the warmth, the soup.

Theon doesn’t realize he’s stopped breathing until Sansa rises to her feet, putting aside her bowl of soup and her slice of bread, both practically untouched. They’ve been sitting here for… Two hours? Or the better half of an hour, or an entire night; Theon struggles with keeping track of time, now, the same way he struggles with keeping his breathing even whenever Sansa is near. It’s a recent discovery -- the sun that saw him and his men ride hard past Castle Cerwyn has barely set, the plans for the battle are barely ready, and Sansa… Theon has noticed how the people of Winterfell barely notice him, when he passes them by, but it’s easy to understand why. Dragons, Unsullied, Dothraki, the unusual Valyrian look of Queen Daenerys, her motley entourage; who remembers the old Stark ward, who has time for him?

It’s different with Sansa, of course. The yard goes silent when she rises, and not just because of the horn; the men huddle closer together, making way for the Lady of Winterfell, moving away from her like shadows creeping away from the sun, like the receding tide. It’s not fear, not exactly. It’s just that every man in the yard has been expecting the dead to descend upon them. Two hours ago, they were determined; an hour ago, they were ready, if not prepared. But now?

Now, doubt is creeping in, and Theon knows doubt can be a dangerous thing. The men watch her, not with typical lust or the cruelty of Ramsay’s people; they watch her as one might look at the sun to know one’s way. But it’s the middle of the night, and the sun is hours from rising.

Theon follows Sansa, focusing on the way her tresses cascade down her back, flame-red on the black of her cloak. He’s seldom looked around, ever since he arrived, because Winterfell isn’t as it once was, of course, Winterfell is back under the rule of House Stark, but shadows are shadows, dark corners are dark corners, strangers with steel are strangers with steel. They go up the northern battlement, move from sentry to sentry, hear the hushed whispers from the men below. Same as with the ragged breathing, Theon only realizes he’s staring at his feet -- as opposed to where his feet are leading him -- when a sentry elbows him in the chest, rough. Accidentally, one assumes, and there’s little doubt about it once the man says: "Sorry, ser. Barely saw you there."

Theon is pretty sure he would’ve earned himself a _Piss off_ rather than any kind of apology, had Sansa not been there, but the _ser_? Maybe, in the dim light, the kraken on his chest resembles the merman of Manderly, the runes of Royce; maybe, in the dim light, the lines on his face are erased, the crooked bones healed.

Sansa gives the sentry a sharp nod, then offers Theon her gloved hand, as if to hurry them along. He takes it, if slowly, feeling the four slender, untouched fingers, the intact thumb pressing into his palm. He wishes she’d remove the glove; he wishes she wouldn’t touch him, because in recent years he’s flinched from even the gentlest of touches -- Yara as she examined the wreck of his right hand, brow furrowed but face closed to him, swearing vengeance on a man she would never be able to reach; It would have been no more difficult to get back at Lann the Clever. The  gentlest of touches -- a dog’s tongue, the cold flow of seawater, the warmth of his gloves, new leather to cover his mangled skin.

Some have gathered on the battlement to gaze into the menacing night, but Theon knows his purpose. Bran has to be in the godswood, and Theon has to be with Bran, to protect him with the arms he once used to grab Winterfell for himself, a lifetime ago, back when the snows always melted, back when he thought himself a Prince and Sansa a stupid little girl, locked away in the distant south. The girl is a woman grown now, of course, and Theon would bare his chest to steel and flame before he let anyone name her anything but strong, steady, the Stark in Winterfell.

He would bare his chest to steel and flame to protect Bran, because maybe if Bran hadn’t been forced away from his childhood home, if Bran hadn’t crossed the Wall and ventured into Gods-knew-what…

"Theon." Sansa, waking him up. As she’d been then -- scared, eyes rabbit-wide; as she is now, dressed in black and deep grey, holding onto his broken hand and not letting go, even as men and women rush past them, even as Theon flinches away from the crowd that’s slowly forming on the battlement. "Theon, let’s go."

He follows. With as much urgency as he followed Robb, years ago, although that wasn’t truly urgency. They were playing at war, even after the Lannisters killed Lord Eddard. They were playing at war and Robb had lost, and Sansa had lost also, but then she’d ended the game, pure and simple. She’d cleaved the board in half.

Theon focuses on flame-red tresses until the blood-red leaves of the weirwood are in sight, until Sansa turns and gives him that look, that same look -- for the barest hint of a second, for a single heartbeat, scared, eyes rabbit-wide, because they’re running and they’re alone, suddenly. He can hear the men in the yard, he can hear shouting from left and right, but if they changed into stone here and there, right now, nobody would notice, not in the dim light.

They do not change into stone. Rather the opposite, Theon would say, if he presumed to know Sansa enough to spot the red on her face, the curve of her mouth, the way she has yet to let go of his glove. Nonsense -- Sansa is strong, steady, the Stark in Winterfell. He’s the one who’s always longed to be a Stark, to be _a Stark’s_ , he’s the one with a lifetime of mistakes to fix, he’s the one hoping that Sansa, if she is plagued by the same nightmares as he, would share them with him--

"I won’t let Bran down," Theon says, because he assumes this is what Sansa must want to hear, what’s needed to make her worry go away. And because his own mind is racing, rabbit-fast. "While I draw breath, I swear..."

"Look after yourself. You didn’t come back here to lose your life, Theon. You came here--" And she tightens her grip on his fingers, then, and she takes his arm proper, and the space between them is narrow enough to hope and choke and hope some more "--to start fresh."

"I came here because the world is ending." Because if barely anyone on Pyke had noticed the little boy who’d left fifteen years ago, nobody would notice the broken man who’d come and gone. Once more, the space between them -- hope, choke, hope. Theon is positive nobody in the world, ending as it might be, deserves Sansa Stark, let alone him. But he embraces her, like they did in the Great Hall, but this one time it’s just them, and the roar of the coming battle.

Sansa goes rigid in his arms, almost like she’s bracing herself for something, and Theon remembers, rabbit-wide and rabbit-fast and the sharp blade and the cruel night. He means to let go, means to apologize, but then she’s clinging onto him as much as he’s clinging onto her. Like when they fell (and flew); like when they fell, and he thought surely he’d killed her, he thought surely the landing would shatter his bones, and it would feel like atonement. But they’d lived; they’d lived, and here they were, furs and leathers, whispers lost in the pitch-black night.

It’s not love; Theon isn’t sure he’s ever been in love, not even when he was playing at war, not even when they fell and flew. But it’s warm, and soft and good and pure, it’s Sansa as she was on that last day, back in the Winterfell of before the wars, the Winterfell of Lord Eddard’s, when Robb had snowflakes on his eyelashes and there were six direwolves strutting about. It’s Sansa as she is now, strong and steady. The only thing keeping him together, inland and miles from the sea.

"Protect Bran," Sansa breathes in the crook of his neck, and that is more warmth that he could ever hope to get by a fireside, "protect Bran and stay alive."

He’s never been very good with the in-between, not even before he--

Sansa takes a step backward, but she doesn’t let go, and Theon gazes -- stares, really, more than is proper -- into her eyes, and she’s warm, alive, real, surely as the heart beating in his own chest, rabbit-fast. He’s never been very good with the in-between or, truth be told, with the before and the after. But Sansa is bold -- strong, steady -- and once more closes the space between them, once more places her gloved hand on his arm, then on his shoulder, then on his cheek, and the feeling of her forehead resting on his own makes Theon feel almost feverish. Lucky, apologetic, unworthy, but then:

"May I?" Sansa is looking at his mouth; Theon watches her watching him, for a moment, because he can barely understand what she’s asking. The dead are coming, the world is ending and, after he gives the bravest nod he can manage, Sansa is pressing her mouth to his. Tentatively, like she’s never kissed anyone before. Tenderly, almost, like when the first snows of winter hit the ground, like when the evening tide comes to shore.

The gentlest of touches, and Theon doesn’t flinch.

"For luck," Sansa whispers, mouth closer now to his chin, his jaw, the hollow of his cheek. Theon hasn’t felt lucky in a long time -- except maybe when they feel and then flew, but Sansa? Sansa is a promise. Strong, steady, the Stark in Winterfell, with flame-red, bright hair like a crown, with snowflakes on her eyelashes, with that same plea, once more, on her summer breath: "Protect Bran and stay alive."

Theon doesn’t promise, because he surely has infinite trust in Sansa but very little in himself. He doesn’t promise, and maybe Sansa doesn’t notice, or doesn’t want to, or knows that dawn may never come. Theon kisses her forehead, her nose, kisses the bright snowflakes, kisses her cheekbones, feather-light kisses for children and young lovers, not for the likes of him. Not her mouth, though; that is more tenderness, more love -- love? -- than is wise, on the eve of battle. That is sacred, like first snows and evening tides, like promises made in the shadow of the godswood.

He doesn’t promise, at least not aloud; he doesn’t look back, when his men -- Yara’s men -- find him and time comes to wheel Bran into the godswood, to protect him and stay alive. Looking back would be a promise in and of itself, and so Theon closes his fingers around the handles of Bran’s wheelchair and marches forward, with snowflakes in his eyes and the warmth of summer clinging to his face.

 _Protect Bran and stay alive_. It stays with him, around his shoulders like a cloak, like the old _Am I your brother, now and always?_

Now and always.

It stays with him, even after his sister’s men are dead and his arms can barely lift his spear and Bran’s eyes are rabbit-wide and white as chalk, and the warmth of summer kisses has left him, and he wishes he’d never let go of Sansa.

_You’re a good man._

_Thank you._

It stays with him, even as he charges forward, running on feet that once betrayed him but now carry him, strong and steady, as surely as tide comes to shore.

**Author's Note:**

> theon & sansa eating soup together >>>
> 
> Thank you so much for reading!


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